


Once, twice

by Rhuia



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Bodyswap, Dub-con elements, M/M, PWP, Sex Pollen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-07
Updated: 2013-07-07
Packaged: 2017-12-17 22:37:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/872747
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rhuia/pseuds/Rhuia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock and John swap bodies.  John doesn't want to talk about it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Once, twice

“When I think about it now,” Sherlock shouted over the din of bells and the sound of the sprinklers starting up, “of _course_ there was always going to be a second alarm.”

A fine yellow mist rained down, smelling vaguely of apples.

“Presumably this nice chemical bath it triggered wasn’t quite as predictable?Or maybe you thought the alarm was to tell you a strongly worded letter to the editor was on its way.”John pulled the collar of his shirt over his head, trying to minimise exposure.

Sherlock glared at him.“Thank _you_.Let’s remember I had limited information to work with – a name and address isn’t what it used to be, you know: breaking into secure facilities takes more than a simple database print out—“His mouth snapped shut and his eyes rolled back in his head, and John had just enough time to grab his arm and pull him in, bracing them both as unconsciousness overtook them and they slid to the floor.

-

When they came to, the sprinklers had stopped and the room was a mess of yellow liquid and paper.

“What the almighty _hell_ ,” John said, sitting up after a bit and staring at his hands, which were now long and white with the sort of knobbly knuckles he’d only ever associated with Sherlock— 

“Oh,” Sherlock said, staring at his own square, blocky ones.“ _Oh_.”

-

If he’d known spending time with Sherlock Holmes meant someday he’d _be_ Sherlock Holmes, John reflected, he’d probably have put more effort into saving the man from himself.Sherlock’s knees were shot, and his feet were completely flat.

“People are meant to have arches, you know” John said, pressing a thumb into the sole of one foot.“How you even walk, let alone leap around the whole day like a bloody impala…”

“I’d be suggesting some ground rules if I were you,” Mycroft said, with a pointed look at Sherlock.Sherlock, who was … who was… “jesus bloody christ,” John said and wrestled his – Sherlock’s – shirt back on.

Sherlock threw his hands up in the air.“Oh well then, _you_ tell me how I’m supposed to gain any empirical evidence from this experience with you so closed off to the endless possibilities just begging to be—“

“Empirical evidence my arse,” John said.He looked at Mycroft.“One week?”

Mycroft nodded.He’d found Jones, who, it had to be said, had been very quick about giving up information about their chemical bath: seven days before it wore off, completely non-toxic, a few nominal side-effects—“Side effects,” John said, sitting up very quickly.

“Dry mouth, slightly blurred vision and, ah,” Mycroft coughed, “some increase in instincts of a prurient nature.”

“Oh god,” John said, putting his head into his hands.

Sherlock said, testily, “John, you’ve got a boil.”

-

The problem was, of course, that once Mycroft had said it naturally stuck in John’s head like the worst kind of dark secret.It shouldn’t have felt as forbidden as it did – it _was_ John’s body now, however temporary: calls of nature still had to be obeyed and things needed to be washed no matter how existential the question of their ownership.

Still, it was hard to deny that he’d never – no.He batted the thought away.No, no, no.Not like this and definitely – _definitely_ – not when Sherlock could actually injure John’s body with nothing more than a thought.

“I wasn’t going to swab the _entire_ penile area,” Sherlock said, sulking.

“Don’t tell me don’t tell me I don’t want to know,” John said, feeling frantic.The sight of his own body hunched over his groin holding a tin of cotton buds and a jar of Vaseline was a vision that was going to live with him forever.“Don’t do any permanent damage, don’t have unprotected sex, don’t inject yourself with carpet cleaner.As for the rest of it: what the eye don’t see the heart don’t grieve over.Everything else that happens this week stays in our respective consciousness and there’s no need for any sharing of any kind, all right?”

“ _Fiiiine_ ,” Sherlock said.“Tragically dull and wretchedly limited, but fine.”He looked at John, frowning a little.“Does my mouth always look like that? What’ve you done to my bottom lip?”

John started guiltily; he’d spent the morning looking at his face in the mirror, running his fingers over the long, pale cheeks, feeling the skin move under his hands, the lips closing hot and soft over his fingers as he sucked them…

“Your bottom lip,” he said, swallowing, “needed lip balm.I’ve been moisturising.”

“ _Have_ you.”Sherlock’s eyes narrowed – which should have looked ridiculous, John thought, on his plain, everyman’s face.It didn’t; it just looked like Sherlock was considering something that John would rather not think about, not at all.

-

The problem was.

The problem was that the next day he woke up, dressed, went for a an extremely brisk walk in the very cold air, had a large, hearty lunch, went back to his room, took off all his clothes and – god help him, the relief was indescribable – touched himself _everywhere_.

His cock was long and slightly curved at the end, his legs were lean and smooth, his nipples were small but endlessly responsive.He rubbed them with the pad of a thumb, licking and wetting it, wetting them, rubbing the slick in, dimly noting how different arousal smelt in this body: a little sharper than his own, maybe, but something sweet in it too.

His cock throbbed and jerked in his hand; a sense memory of some kind made him circle it with his thumb and forefinger, just pulling lightly on it and god, _god_ , yes.This was what Sherlock’s body wanted, this feather-light touch just barely easing off the urgency.Up and down, light, slow, his body burning under it.

He didn’t let himself come; it felt uneasily like a step too far, and anyway, it didn’t feel like he wanted to, like something was missing.Whatever that meant.He was going on raw instinct now, logic be damned.Sherlock’s mind was probably horrified with how he was trying to make it fit Sherlock’s body.

Afterwards, going downstairs, he felt his shirt dragging across his nipples and almost bolted back to his room.

-

There were two days left to go in the week from hell when Lestrade called them out to a crime scene in Lambdon Place: a dead body with no foreign DNA and no signs of a struggle.They’d agreed they were going to stay off cases until the effects wore off, but:

“Jam.You never told me about you and jam.I ate seven spoonfuls straight out of the jar before I could be sure,” Sherlock said, looking wild-eyed.He was in his own dressing gown, but John’s body was a couple of inches too short for it and it pooled around his ankles.“In here, locked in here, in your body, John.Come on.We need to _go_.”

John felt a slight pang, watching him shrug the gown off; Sherlock was wearing John’s parka now and John’s braced, square shoulders and John’s slightly too-thin mouth, but the rest of it – the quick, restless genius of him, the joy of the chase already in his eyes – the rest of it was Sherlock.It was no wonder he wanted to get out.As if John’s body could contain that, contain him.

-

Lestrade took one look at them and cleared the room.“Don’t tell me. Just …oh bloody hell,” he said, watching Sherlock stalk around the body, blond head bending over the body, whipping his magnifier out of the back pocket of John’s corduroys.

He looked John up and down, scarf wound around his black curls, huddled into Sherlock’s completely inadequate coat.John opened his mouth and Lestrade shook his head.“No, really, I don’t want to know. _Really_.”

“You’re right, there’s nothing here,” Sherlock said.“The house, though – about three, four years old? Brand new.Revolting olde worlde fixtures.”He rushed out and they followed him, Lestrade looking warily at John as they went.

“You, er, all right in there?” he said.“Treating you well, is he?”

“You’ve no idea,” John said, trying to get the coat’s collar to stand up a little more.“How anyone can have this much chest area and not want to wrap up warmer baffles me.He doesn’t even own a jersey.It’s a miracle he didn’t die of pneumonia years ago.”

They caught up to Sherlock, who was kneeling in front of the front door, cooing over the doorknob.He’d snapped on a pair of gloves.“Round handle,” he said, gleefully.“ _And_ wooden, excellent.Both fashionable and,” he gently unscrewed it, “perfect for catching DNA.Eight times out of ten the killer takes off his or her gloves before they get to the front door.Opens the door with their fingers wedged,” he made a circle with his thumb and forefinger and turned it, delicately, “right in the groove.“

John stared at his hand, the blunt nails, the familiar neatness of his palms; all the blood in his body had rushed to his cock the exact second Sherlock had touched his fingers together.

“Fantastic,” he said, thickly.Sherlock threw him a sharp look.

By the time they got back to the flat John was dry-mouthed, nerves stretched tight across his body like wire.Sherlock didn’t look much better; his cheeks were flushed and his lips were red, like they’d been bitten.

When Sherlock took his parka off, John saw the flush went all the way down his neck and to his chest.He’d be so warm under John’s hands.John’s body might not be a long, lovely ripple of glowing skin, but he knew he was strong, his chest tight with muscle.Sherlock moved so well in his body, used it so well.

“I,” Sherlock said calmly, “am going to go and have a wank.”

“Shut up shut up,” John said, but oh christ he wasn’t dry-mouthed anymore; he was practically drooling now.

“You’re being ridiculous,” Sherlock said, starting to unbutton his shirt.It was flannel and brown and looked soft against Sherlock’s hands.“I’ve already had my fingers up myself twice today and I’ve come eight times.I intend to come at least another five more.”He paused, thoughtfully.“All things going well, once from anal stimulation alone.”He wet his lips.“Did you know about your thing with toes? No? Shame.”

“ _Jesus christ_.”John leaned against a wall and thumped his head back on it, feeling weak and burnt alive all at the same time.He did know about his thing with toes.“Sherlock will you just—“

“Be careful of anal tears? Drink plenty of fluids? Password lock my YouTube channel?”Sherlock shrugged.“Consider me the custodian of your wellbeing and virtue, John.”His shirt was unbuttoned all the way now and he was shrugging it off.The blond hair on his chest looked fine and soft, and his skin was a pale gold. _His_ skin. _His_ skin.John felt his mind turn over with lust and hunger and not a little confusion.

“My wellbeing.”John tried not to sound bitter; he was half mad by now and not even slightly in control of whatever was coming out his mouth.“My _wellbeing_.Fuck.”

“Yes,” Sherlock said, still in that infuriatingly calm voice, “I’d like that.But in the face of your reluctance I only have a limited range of options available.”

“I can’t hear this,” John said.“We’re not ourselves – yes, yes, shut up I know – and we’ve got something in us making this stupid artificial sexual tension – god I can’t _look_ at my hands without wanting to – and you, it’s all in the name of ticking a box somewhere for you.”

“In my defence,” Sherlock said, “it’s quite a good box to tick.”

“You would say that,” John said.“But you’re Sherlock bloody Holmes and after it’s all over and done you’ll be able to say you got that one thing out of it, at the very least.”

“John,” Sherlock said.All the humour was gone now; he sounded unsure.

“No, it’s fine,” John said.“I know it’s – I don’t expect you to hold out, or try and live by my...”He closed his eyes and felt how every part of his body was alight and fizzing, like someone had put a match to all his nerve endings.“Just.Just don’t tell me, right?”

When he opened his eyes again, Sherlock was gone.

-

Waking up the next morning was the worst kind of torture; whatever was happening to their bodies seemed to hit its apex then, and John’s cock was so hard dressing was agony.Sherlock’s phone buzzed; he answered it without thinking.

“Sherlo – John?” Lestrade said.“Can you come down? There’s been another body.”

-

They took the Tube to get there.Of course it was rush hour – of _course_ it was – and the carriage was packed.They ended up jammed together, standing so close John could feel every breath Sherlock took.

God, he smelled amazing: clean, with a faint grassy note underneath.He was so close his mouth was almost on John’s throat, and when the carriage swayed they were jolted together, Sherlock’s body on his, the press of it hot and so delicious, christ.He hadn’t put any limitations on the _doing_ , after all.Had he? Just the telling of it.Just the knowing of it.

John tried to swallow a groan; it took everything he had not to just rub up against Sherlock, press their cocks together and undulate a little against him.Just to get a little friction, just a little bit, enough so their cocks could nudge each other through their clothes, ride each other just a little, slide and grind just enough that heat would start to inch along his body, he was so greedy for it, wanted to – Sherlock made a hoarse little sound, and John jerked away, dazed, realising he’d started to rock against Sherlock.Sherlock’s eyes were blue and hot and he was as hard as John was.

“Sorry,” John said, not sorry at all.It had felt so good, so bloody good.

Their stop was next and when they both poured out with the crowd, John wanted to use that as an excuse to press close up against Sherlock again, but the crowd separated them and when they joined up again it had thinned, and the excuse was gone.

-

There really wasn’t any DNA this time: “the door handle’s a lever, and brass,” Lestrade said, but Sherlock wasn’t interested and was knocking on neighbours’ doors all around for the next half hour, asking if they’d seen a dog anywhere near the victim’s house yesterday.

“Got John doing your legwork now?” Anderson said.

“Little white thing, like them bits of popcorn,” said an old woman two doors down, nodding.“Was a man walking it, but couldn’t tell you nothing more.”

“Traces of dog food,” Sherlock said, pointing out a few crumbs near the front door.“Likely caught in the attacker’s shoe—fed the pet, stepped on a bit.Makes them local if they’re walking their dog.”

They paired off, the cops in plainclothes and he and Sherlock, and spread themselves out as wide as they could go over the area, checking out anyone with a dog.A few looked likely, but Sherlock shook his head each time, and John texted _no, no, no_ each time to Lestrade until: “there,” Sherlock said, and they followed him until he stopped to chat up a girl by the side of a bus stop; she looked almost exactly like the victim.The dog whined and barked at them; the man turned, saw them, and they only had time to blink once before he was off, veering towards an alley.

He was fast, and tall, and quick over the chain-mail fence between the road and the alley.John had a minute to savour the difference the extra inches made; he hauled himself over it, sharp and quick, and heard the scrape and curse behind him as Sherlock forgot he was in a shorter man’s body and got caught on the way up.

He ran the man down, leaping on him at the last minute.There was a moment when the man’s bigger frame looked to win the tussle and his hands crept up towards John’s throat but John suddenly remembered what to do with his elbows and his thumbs, and the insides of his knees.Sherlock had _very_ sharp elbows.By the time Sherlock caught up with him, John was straddling the man, holding his wrists behind him.

\- 

They caught a cab back because John was a mess; he sat back against the seats and thought about what it might have been like if they’d come back on the Tube, after all: sweaty, torn, and him bruised from where he’d been clipped around the chin.Sherlock’s trousers had a rip in them, dangerously close to a pocket; John’s shirt was missing buttons.If they’d been pressed together on the train, John could have slipped a hand into that tear and let the tips of his fingers rest on the skin underneath.He knew that part of his body: smooth and warm on the upper thigh

“I hate wearing this coat, you know,” he said, and put his hand on Sherlock’s crotch.

“Too long? The wrong cut? I’ve a theory that you hold your arms differently than I do.It’s possibly straining the coat across the shoulders.”Sherlock pressed up against his hand and John slid it along the length of him.He was hot even through his trousers; John had never thought of himself as particularly well-endowed, but he knew what a sweet, heavy mouthful that cock would make now that it would be Sherlock in his mouth.

“It’s bloody freezing.Is it some superior kind of cardboard?” John said, and massaged Sherlock all along the thick, beautiful length of him till he made a broken, hissing noise.

-

Sherlock shoved him through their front door.“Just to be clear,” he said, holding up a hand.

“Don’t talk about it after, yes,” John said, and lunged.

It was the oddest for a long minute: the taste half strange, half familiar and then both halves swirling and separating again.Their lips rubbed together a little, then Sherlock grabbed his face and leaned his whole _body_ into the kiss.John was a slow kisser by nature and there was nothing gentle about this but it made his belly heat and his fingers throb anyway; his body knew what it liked and so did Sherlock – Sherlock, who wasn’t holding back, tangling his tongue with John’s, making little choking sounds into his mouth, slipping his fingers in for John to suck.He pulled back, looking satisfied when John panted and swirled his tongue around them, frantic.

They each knew what the other wanted, and exactly how much of it, and it was simultaneously exhilarating and terrifying to have that sort of knowledge about someone else; John wanted to do everything to Sherlock, and he knew every single way Sherlock would want it.He could make Sherlock come by sucking on his _ears_.

“God I love that,” John said.“You know I love that, ah come here, come here,” and bit down on the fleshy mound under Sherlock’s thumb.Sherlock groaned and John moved his mouth down, using the flat of his tongue to lick big, soft patterns all over Sherlock’s chest.

“Fuck this is so,” John panted, “I can feel everything you want.Here?” and mouthed gently at the tender skin just under Sherlock’s navel, the little strip of pale soft skin; Sherlock pushed him off, hands clutching at John’s shoulders.“Here, you like it here,” Sherlock said, thick and unsteady, nuzzling and biting under John’s ribs.

It got confusing: there was a desperate, impatient desire to put their mouths everywhere the other wanted – John needed to – god he was _dying_ to –“ah that’s,” Sherlock said, arching up when John’s teeth shook his nipple gently, and then John rubbed his face all over them to soothe it, just the way Sherlock liked.

“Do you really know everything?” Sherlock rolled on top of him. “ _Everything_ I want? I know what you want, John. All of it.I think I’ve done it all a least once, to practice.I’ll bend over and let you lick me, later.That was beyond even me.”

After that it was a frenzy of teeth and tongues and lips, hands gripping – they were scrambling over each other trying to do it all, taste it all, fingers tangling in – “ _Ah_ ,” Sherlock said very, very quietly when John put his hands in Sherlock’s hair and tugged back sharply, and their cocks rubbed together and leaked all over them, both of them writhing and slipping against each other, straining to find purchase…

John pulled even harder, and Sherlock said, “ngggghhhh,” and came in hot, white splashes all over John; a drop landed on John’s lips.

“Next time you’re coming on my face,” Sherlock said, eyes wide open the bastard, and John came with a whimper.

-

It turned out they both knew their refractory periods to the second; Sherlock climbed on him and rolled a condom on his hardening cock.

“I’ll … oh god,” John said, letting his head fall back when Sherlock reached around himself with a fingerful of lube.

He had to hold in a breath when Sherlock eased himself down over John, slow and liquid and impossibly beautiful – John’s scarred, worn body holding in Sherlock Holmes was _beautiful_.Sherlock panted, “you can, you can, I know you want to,” and John thrust up because Sherlock wanted it, too.Sherlock’s body wanted to be impaled, wanted it hard and mindless the first time, to lose itself and writhe around – so John did it to his.Sherlock whined, meeting him halfway and oh god, he was clenched so tight around John, so hot and perfect, shifting to the right before John even knew it was what he’d wanted, whipping his hips in tiny, mind-numbing little circles.John thumbed the tip of Sherlock’s cock and said, feverishly, “get off Sherlock, roll over come on.”

“No, what?You like this.I can feel you like this.”Sherlock looked down, surprised out of his rhythm; John _did_ like it, god, he could have Sherlock riding on his cock all day.But Sherlock rolled off and John climbed on top of him, pulling Sherlock’s legs over his shoulders.“Hold on to the headboard,” John said.“Don’t let go.Your hands don’t move, not until I say so,” because he knew about this too, and it had scorched up the edges of his hunger like wildfire when he’d first realised it.

Sherlock said, “John, I won’t last five minutes,” but his eyes had gone black and hot, and he curled his hands around the bars, breathing hard.

“Yeah,” John said, roughly, and sank back into him.Sherlock used the bars for leverage, pushed back.John almost blacked out for a minute from the overload of sensation: Sherlock was wet velvet around his cock, and splayed out like a feast, arms tight over his head, cock leaking everywhere.John got a hand around it, jerking Sherlock off roughly, working his hips hard, in and out of all that heat; “you’re amazing,” he said, “amazing, god, look at you.”

Sherlock looked at him with wild, blue eyes.“No, no,” he said, “if I’d ever known, if I’d ever suspected….why’ve you wasted so much _time_?”

John laughed, a little shakily.And yet – if there was ever a person in the world to see a thing for what it truly was, it was Sherlock Holmes.It was just possible he’d never even seen his own body awkwardly containing John Watson this whole time.He’d just been focused on John, and John – John had asked him to deny it all, right from the very start.

John turned his head into Sherlock’s calf, resting by his cheek.“I,” he said, and then his mind caught up with his body and it was all too much, the feel of two bodies needing him, wanting them both back, and Sherlock watching him through the heat and urgency, waiting for something.

“Sherlock,” he said, and came, jerking Sherlock even harder and dimly heard Sherlock make a sound; his cock pulsed under John’s hand, and he shuddered.On and on the white heat went behind John’s eyes; John knew he was groaning, kissing Sherlock through it, everything a hopeless tangle of sweaty limbs and reddened skin and oh god, Sherlock was still holding onto the bars, still trying to cling onto John’s cock with his body.

“Come on,” John said, gathering him in and it was a matter of seconds before he felt his eyes close, his face buried in Sherlock’s sandy hair.

-

He knew exactly where he was, as soon as he woke up.Possibly more importantly, he knew _who_ he was.Short, blunt fingers, stocky chest, a day’s worth of stubble on his face – Sherlock never seemed to need to shave.Everything back in its place, his body snapping back into the slight edge of wariness that never seemed to leave him.

Sherlock was awake beside him, watching him.

“Happened about an hour ago,” he said.Their positions were reversed now, of course, and it was Sherlock looking down at him.

“Oh my god, my arse,” John said, suddenly feeling it hit him: a sore, stretched, empty feeling.

Sherlock frowned.‘Did I—“

John was bitten all over, sticky with come, his whole body felt singed and handled and used.“Jesus, I feel _glorious_ ,” he said.“Come here, do it again.”

Sherlock chuckled.“What happened to never speaking about it?”

John stretched out under him, rubbing up until things began to move to his satisfaction.“I didn’t want us to talk about it after it was over,” he said, “because I didn’t want to know what I’d missed out on.You in that room, in my body, fingers in me and god knows what you bought off the Internet.”He put his hands under the covers.

“I’ll show you,” Sherlock gasped, when John moved his fingers against him.“Now.Later.Whenever you want.”

“Right.So I did miss things, then,” John said, moving his hand in a completely different direction.

“A little,” Sherlock admitted, writhing.“Bits and pieces.One very good hour with a glass – _oh_.Oh, _god_.”

“Excellent,” John said.“We’ll have to talk all about it very, very soon.”

Sherlock made a low, wailing sound, right into his shoulder.

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the 24-hour come_at_once porn tag challenge. With thanks to [musamihi](http://musamihi.livejournal.com/) for the prompt and [mistyzeo](http://mistyzeo.livejournal.com/) for running such a fun challenge!


End file.
